Over the next 72 hours brutal Arctic blizzards - bringing with it barrages of snow - will sweep the UK in the latest big freeze.

New weather maps have turned purple and white indicating that snow is on its way very soon.

WXCharts maps showed that an icy front began to set in across Scotland, Northern England and the East of England in the early hours of this morning.

Scotland is barely visible under a wall of snow and the Highlands are expected to see the brunt of the icy weather with 2cm of snow expected to fall per hour. Other parts of Scotland could experience 1cm of snowfall every hour.

Elsewhere, Yorkshire and the Humber are predicted to have the worst weather in England with 1cm of snow expected to fall per hour.

Key towns and cities including Middlebrough, York, Leeds and Manchester are all predicted to see a dusting of snow today.

And towards the south Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk could all see snow depths reach 3cm.

Temperatures will take a nosedive tonight and into tomorrow morning as the whole of the UK apart from South West England and Wales will see the mercury plunge to below freezing.

In the North East and Yorkshire and the Humber the mercury will hover around a brutal -5C whilst in Scotland temperature will drop further to a bone chilling -8C.

During the early hours of tomorrow morning the mercury will hover at an icy -3C in London.

And the weather shows no signs of easing off there and will in fact get worse. Up to 10cm of snow could fall per hour in Perth and Kinross in Scotland whilst Stirling is predicted to have 7cm of snowfall every hour.

Around 4cm of snow will fall every hour in Southern parts of Scotland and 1cm in the Scottish Highlands.

Separately, in the Met Office's weather outlook for tonight the forecaster is warning that outbreaks of rain will spread from Northern Ireland into Scotland and northern England and this will fall "as snow for a time".

Tomorrow will be "rather cold" and "windy in the west and north".

However, the cloud will break in the "south to allow some sunshine".